Master Notes for Midterm 2

Theory

A set of connected ideas or principles used to explain a phenomenon.

Features of a useful theory

Evidence-supported, falsifiable, parsimonious.

Evidence-supported

A theory should be consistent with observations and research.

Falsifiable

There must be possible evidence that could show the theory is wrong.

Parsimonious

Explains something complicated using relatively few principles or assumptions.

Community and exclusion

Communities create boundaries between people who belong and those considered outsiders.

Authorized Knowers

People or groups whose claims are treated as credible and legitimate.

Criminological Knowledge

Bodies of ideas used to explain crime, criminality, and responses to crime.

Positivism

Emphasizes scientific observation and evidence to identify the causes of crime.

Eugenics

Applied biological/hereditary thinking to society, believed that undesirable characteristics could be prevented from being passed to future generations.

Labeling Theory

Deviance results partly from other people applying rules and sanctions to someone labelled an 'offender'.

Primary Deviance

Initial deviant behavior that does not change someone's identity significantly.

Secondary Deviance

Develops through repeated behavior and social reaction, leading to incorporation into a person's self-concept.

Routine Activity Theory

Crime becomes more likely with the convergence of a motivated offender, a suitable target, and the absence of a capable guardian.

Rational Choice Theory

Offenders make decisions based on perceived benefits, costs, effort, and risks of an offence.

General Strain Theory

Strains are experiences perceived as negative that generate distress and may create an incentive for criminal coping.

Developmental Taxonomy

Different offending pathways require different explanations, distinguishing between adolescent-limited and life-course persistent offenders.

Youth Drug Distribution

Includes peer-network dealing, street-involved dealing, and organized networks.

Substance Use Prevention and Harm Reduction

Emphasizes minimizing harm while supporting individuals who continue to use substances.

Violence as Rhetoric

Rhetoric concerns how language frames an issue and persuades people to respond in certain ways.

Broken Windows Theory

Visible disorder can signal that an area is not being monitored, leading to further disorder and crime.

Responsibilization

Shifting responsibility for managing crime and risk toward individuals, families, businesses, and communities.

Theory

A set of connected ideas or principles used to explain a phenomenon.

Features of a useful theory

Evidence-supported, falsifiable, parsimonious.

Evidence-supported

A theory should be consistent with observations and research.

Falsifiable

There must be possible evidence that could show the theory is wrong.

Parsimonious

Explains something complicated using relatively few principles or assumptions.

Community and exclusion

Communities create boundaries between people who belong and those considered outsiders.

Authorized Knowers

People or groups whose claims are treated as credible and legitimate.

Criminological Knowledge

Bodies of ideas used to explain crime, criminality, and responses to crime.

Positivism

Emphasizes scientific observation and evidence to identify the causes of crime.

Eugenics

Applied biological/hereditary thinking to society, believed that undesirable characteristics could be prevented from being passed to future generations.

Labeling Theory

Deviance results partly from other people applying rules and sanctions to someone labelled an 'offender'.

Primary Deviance

Initial deviant behavior that does not change someone's identity significantly.

Secondary Deviance

Develops through repeated behavior and social reaction, leading to incorporation into a person's self-concept.

Routine Activity Theory

Crime becomes more likely with the convergence of a motivated offender, a suitable target, and the absence of a capable guardian.

Rational Choice Theory

Offenders make decisions based on perceived benefits, costs, effort, and risks of an offence.

General Strain Theory

Strains are experiences perceived as negative that generate distress and may create an incentive for criminal coping.

Developmental Taxonomy

Different offending pathways require different explanations, distinguishing between adolescent-limited and life-course persistent offenders.

Youth Drug Distribution

Includes peer-network dealing, street-involved dealing, and organized networks.

Substance Use Prevention and Harm Reduction

Emphasizes minimizing harm while supporting individuals who continue to use substances.

Violence as Rhetoric

Rhetoric concerns how language frames an issue and persuades people to respond in certain ways.

Broken Windows Theory

Visible disorder can signal that an area is not being monitored, leading to further disorder and crime.

Responsibilization

Shifting responsibility for managing crime and risk toward individuals, families, businesses, and communities.

Cesare Lombroso

Italian physician considered the founder of biological positivism, who argued that criminals are biological throwbacks to earlier evolutionary stages.

Atavism

The biological concept proposing that certain individuals possess physical and psychological traits reminiscent of ancestral evolutionary phases.

Edwin Lemert

Sociologist who established the core labeling theory distinction between primary deviance and secondary deviance.

Howard Becker

Sociologist who authored Outsiders and proposed that deviance is not a quality of the act, but rather a consequence of the application of rules.

Master Status

A primary social identity that overshadows all other personal traits in how an individual is perceived and treated by society.

Moral Entrepreneurs

Individuals or groups who lead campaigns to create, enforce, or transform legal definitions and social boundaries.

Lawrence Cohen and Marcus Felson

Criminologists who introduced Routine Activity Theory in 1979 to analyze spatial and temporal patterns of predatory crime.

Capable Guardian

A person, system, or formal entity whose presence serves to protect a target and discourage offending behavior.

Suitable Target

A person or property whose value, visibility, physical access, and inertia make it vulnerable to illegal acts.

Derek Cornish and Ronald Clarke

Theorists who developed the criminological model of rational choice emphasizing situational deterrence and bounded reasoning.

Bounded Rationality

The recognition that human decisions are constrained by limited information, available time, and cognitive shortcuts.

Robert Agnew

Sociologist who revised classic strain perspectives to create General Strain Theory, emphasizing interpersonal stressors and emotions.

Three Categories of Strain (Agnew)

Failure to achieve positively valued goals, removal of positive stimuli, and confrontation with noxious stimuli.

Terrie Moffitt

Psychologist who formulated the dual developmental taxonomy to classify distinct longitudinal delinquency pathways.

Adolescent-Limited Pathway

Offending trajectory characterized by non-violent delinquency during teenage years that desists upon transition into adult roles.

Life-Course Persistent Pathway

Offending trajectory originating from early neurodevelopmental vulnerabilities combined with adverse environments, continuing across adulthood.

Maturity Gap

The developmental disconnect between physical/biological maturity and social independence that can motivate teenage rule-breaking.

James Q. Wilson and George L. Kelling

Theorists who co-authored the 1982 Atlantic article introducing Broken Windows Theory.

David Garland

Sociologist of law who identified the responsibilization strategy within late-modern governance and penal culture.

Situational Crime Prevention

A preventive framework that alters specific micro-environments to increase the effort and risk of crime while lowering rewards.